Foreign Minister Julie Bishop says the government will not be rushing to use the double dissolution election trigger.
"Just because you're given a trigger, doesn't mean you have to pull it," she told the National Press Club.
The Federal Government has been handed its first potential trigger for a double-dissolution election after the Senate’s rejection of legislation to abolish the Clean Energy Finance Corporation.
The Greens joined Labor in opposing the legislation, leading the Senate to reject it a second time.
A raft of other bills to repeal the carbon tax may face the same fate when they are put to the Senate.
The Government is expected to introduce those after July 1, when those senators who won seats in last year’s federal election finally take their seats and the balance of power shifts away from the Greens to Clive Palmer’s Palmer United Party.
In the Senate today, Greens Leader Christine Milne challenged the Government to go back to the people.
“If you are so convinced that ignoring climate change...is the way to go, go to an election on it,” Senator Milne said.
Finance Minister Mathias Cormann said the Government had a mandate to proceed with the legislation.
“The judgment of the Australian people is very clear,” Senator Cormann said.
Retiring Labor Senator Louise Pratt accused the Government of treating the renewable energy sector as “a joke”.
Under the Constitution, legislation becomes a potential trigger for a double-dissolution election if the Senate rejects it twice within three months between the votes.
It is then up to the Government to decide whether it chooses to go to the Governor-General and seeks to have both houses of Parliament dissolved and call an election, on the basis that the Senate is preventing it from governing.
Double-dissolutions are rare and if a government was contemplating seeking one, it would usually store up a number of potential triggers and use one as the basis for seeking the election.
If it went to a double-dissolution and won, all pieces of rejected legislation are then passed by a joint sitting of both houses after the election – an incentive for the Government to line up as many pieces of difficult-to-pass legislation as possible, in advance.
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